• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.13 no.12
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• pp.41-52
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• 2015

Purpose - Given globalization, the new niche market of medical tourism is likely to experience sustainable growth for various reasons, such as aging populations and a shift in the medical consumerism paradigm toward prevention. Importantly, understanding medical customers' behavior is necessary to benefit from a competitive advantage in this industry. The existing research primarily accessed the key factors of medical quality and costs to explain health customers' behavior but is limited in terms of enabling an understanding of the decision process. This limitation exists because, given the intangibility and greater associated risks in the highly professional industry of international medical tourism, most customers lack the knowledge and experience needed to evaluate the central factors-such as the medical competence of health care countries-before purchases. Therefore, they actively search for useful information through various distributions to reduce uncertainty and to make better choices. Interestingly, most of these information channels are associated with word-of-mouth (WOM). However, no evidence is found in the literature to estimate the effect of WOM in the medical tourism field. Thus, this study focuses on WOM to explore its interaction with key medical characteristic factors and the attractiveness of destinations referred to by sources. This study also affects customers' evaluations and, in turn, influences their intention to seek health care services abroad. Research design, data, and methodology - The literature review addressed an interesting research model for estimating the relations among WOM, medical characteristics, attractiveness, and customers' choice intention regarding international health care. In the key economic regions in China, such as Beijing, Shanghai, Jiangsu, Shandong, and Guangdong, 2,500 survey questionnaires were distributed to potential customers of different ages, education, and income levels. A resulting 1,717 (68.68 percent of the original 2,500) usable surveys were obtained for analysis. Moderated regression analysis was used to determine the effects of WOM in the decision process regarding international health care destinations. Results - The results indicate that WOM is a good moderator of the relationships between the factors evaluated by sources and customers. More importantly, the WOM effects reflect the factors of tie strength, credibility, and vividness. The results also reveal that, given the moderating role of WOM, the intention of potential Chinese customers to seek the referred health care country varies according to the medical characteristics of medical competency and reputation as evaluated by customers. In contrast, the travel attractiveness of the attractions, facilities, accessibility, and social environment are critical determinants of destination choice intention. Conclusions - The moderating role of WOM has been confirmed through the international healthcare destination selection process. Medical tourism managers should user WOM as an effective marketing tool for industry development. Specially, marketers should consider the effects of WOM determinants, such as tie strength, credibility, and vividness, to develop an effective strategy. Furthermore, this study estimates the factors that affect customers' selection of medical tourism destinations. Health care managers or policy makers should consider a broad variety of variables that may attract more Chinese customers to international health care.

• The Mathematical Education
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• v.55 no.3
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• pp.357-382
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• 2016

The purpose of this study was to report the effects of self-directed and self-regulated learning programs on elementary, middle, and high school students through meta-analysis of previous studies. For this research, 22 of previous studies were selected which were all conducted in the country, and calculated the effect size of 'standardized change of the mean difference' for many factors included in each research. The findings were as follows: first, the overall effect sizes of self-directed and self-regulated learning programs on elementary, middle, and high school students were .665 and .702 in the affective and cognitive domain, respectively, meaning that the self-directed and self-regulated learning programs had average or greater effects on elementary, middle, and high school students and exerted somewhat greater effects in the cognitive domain. Second, when the areas of moderating effects were divided into self-directed and self-regulated learning, the former and latter had more influences on the cognitive and affective domains, respectively. Third, the elementary school level recorded a larger effect size both in the affective and cognitive domains than the secondary school level. Fourth, the findings show that the characteristics of affective domain, "reflective thinking" and "self-confidence," recorded a very large effect size both at the elementary and secondary school levels. Finally, the programs were more effective when the application period was one to four weeks in the affective domain and more than four weeks in the cognitive domain. And, Significance and implications of this research were discussed.

• Korean Journal of Child Education & Care
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• v.18 no.4
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• pp.159-173
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• 2018

Objective: The main purpose of this study was examine the relationships among goodness of fit between mother and child, child's self-esteem and quality of home environment. Also, the moderating effects of quality of home environment among preschoolers were investigated in the relation of interest in this study. Methods: The study subjects were 195 children who attended preschools, located in Seoul. The preschoolers' self-esteem was tested by the trained researcher, and both of levels of goodness of fit between the mother-child and quality of home environment were rated by the mothers of this study. Results: The main results of this study found that levels of preschoolers' self-esteem were positively related to goodness of fit between the mother-child, and quality of home environment. Furthermore, the effects of goodness of fit between mother-child on preschoolers' cognitive, physical, and emotional self-esteem were moderated by the quality of home environment. Conclusion/Implications: Along with those findings, implications for research and practice were discussed.

• Journal of the Korean Operations Research and Management Science Society
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• v.40 no.1
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• pp.35-55
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• 2015

In this research, we analyze the effects of price discounts and scarcity message (both quantity limitation message and time limitation message) on the purchase intention in the smart-phone environment. The purchase intention becomes higher at high discount rate and with scarcity message (both quantity limitation message and time limitation message). We also analyze the moderating effects of consumer's shopping value and distance between the consumer and the store on the effects of price discounts and scarcity message (both quantity limitation message and time limitation message) on the purchase intention. On average, the effects of price discount, time limitation message and quantity limitation message on the purchase intention become the highest levels for consumers pursuing hedonic shopping value. The effects of price discount, time limitation message and quantity limitation message on the purchase intention become higher when they are offered within a short distance between the coupon provider and the target customer.

• Asia Marketing Journal
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• v.22 no.1
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• pp.61-79
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• 2020

This research examines how processing type and alignability moderate the effect of product type on satisfaction (i.e., happiness). It is well known that there are two types of processing-deliberative and intuitive processing. Based on the previous literature that the intuitive processing is compatible with experiential purchases and the deliberative processing is fit with material purchase, the current research demonstrates that processing type moderates the effect of product type on happiness. Moreover, we hypothesize that alignability moderates the effect of product type on anticipated satisfaction. As expected, participants in the intuitive processing condition reported greater happiness from their experiential purchases than material purchases. However, in the deliberative processing condition, there was no significant difference between happiness levels from material and experiential purchases. Furthermore, when the attributes of choice options were presented in a non-alignable manner, participants reported greater anticipated satisfaction from experiential purchases than from material purchases. However, this difference disappeared when attributes were presented in an alignable manner. Finally, we propose 'choice process' satisfaction as a potential mediator of the moderating effect of processing type on the relationship between product type and (anticipated) satisfaction.

• Culinary science and hospitality research
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• v.17 no.1
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• pp.110-123
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• 2011

The purpose of this paper is twofold: (1) to investigate how the online communities of restaurants affect the members and create the value by exploring some desirable member behaviors related to the membership, and (2) to examine the possible moderating effect of topic involvement on a member behavior paradigm. The sense of membership was proposed as a prerequisite determinant of two basic member behavior (i.e., purchase-related behavior and group-related behavior). Results of this study confirmed that the level of a member's sense of membership had a positive effect on his/her member behavior. The topic involvement levels of a member was further revealed to strengthen the magnitudes of the proposed relationships. Highly involved members were more likely to engage in both purchase-related behavior and group-related behavior when they were attached to their communities.

• Health Policy and Management
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• v.17 no.3
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• pp.68-86
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• 2007

This study was performed to explore the effect of customer satisfaction and switching barriers on customer royalties in medical services. 900 households, 1% sample were randomly selected from K city located in Kangwon province. Interview survey was performed with structured questionnaire for the entire people, 923 persons who experienced medical service utilization during one year before survey on time, september, 2002. In comparison of switching barriers by sociodemographic characteristics, lower income group and lower educated group showed the higher level of recognition level on availability of changing the service provider significantly. In terms of economic loss as one of switching barriers, the group of over aged 61, the lower income group and the lower educated group felt higher than other groups. Also, the time loss of switching barrier was recognized in 41-60 aged group and employee in service industry highly. For the perceived risk factor as another switching barrier, the high educated group showed the higher recognition level in performance risk and felt higher social risk than other groups. In analysis of customer satisfaction and loyalty levels by switching barrier components, the lower level of availability of changing the service provider and the higher level of recognition for economic and time loss, they showed the higher satisfaction and loyalty levels. In final step, multiple regression analysis showed the positive relationship between customer satisfaction, switching barrier and customer loyalties. Besides, the moderating effect of switching barrier in relationship between customer satisfaction and loyalties was significant and this results suggests that the influence of customer satisfaction to customer loyalties might be weakened in high level of recognition for switching barrier. In conclusion, perceived risk of economic and time loss as switching barrier is an important factor and should be considered in planning of marketing strategy carefully in terms of defensive marketing.

• Research in Community and Public Health Nursing
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• v.32 no.2
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• pp.195-204
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• 2021

Purpose: This study was to determine how attitude, subjective norm, and perceived behavioral control (PBC) were related to parents' intentions to vaccinate their sons in elementary school against human papillomavirus (HPV), applying the updated theory of planned behavior. Two hypotheses were examined: PBC would moderate the relationship of attitude to intention and subjective norm to intention, respectively. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study with 231 participants recruited in November, 2018. Inclusion criteria for the participants were parents with 5th-6th grade boys in elementary schools. The moderation effects of the hypotheses were analyzed using the PROCESS macro for SPSS. Results: PBC significantly moderated the relationship of attitude to intention on HPV vaccination. The simple effect of attitude to intention was significant under three different levels of the PBC (low, moderate, and high), but the magnitudes of the relationships were not homogeneous. The magnitude of the relationship between attitude and intention was the lowest for the parents with the low level of the PBC. In the relationship of subjective norm to intention on HPV vaccination, the moderating effect of the PBC was not supported. Subjective norm and PBC directly predicted the intention on HPV vaccination. Conclusion: In order to promote the parents' intentions to vaccinate their sons in elementary school against HPV, we need a program that can improve parents' attitude, subjective norm, and PBC, requiring special attention to the parents with the low PBC.

• Animal Bioscience
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• v.35 no.12
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• pp.1881-1891
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• 2022

Objective: The present study aimed to quantify the effects of fermented soybean meal (FSBM) on broiler chickens' performance by employing a meta-analysis approach. Methods: A total of 16 studies were included in the database after being systematically selected using a PRISMA protocol. Hedges' g effect size was used to quantify pooled standardized mean difference (SMD) using random-effects models at 95% confidence intervals (95% CI). Publication bias among studies was computed with Egger's test and visualized using funnel plots. Results: Results indicated that dietary FSBM inclusion increased final body weight (BW) (SMD = 0.586, 95% CI: 0.221 to 0.951, p = 0.002) of broiler chickens, particularly in starter period (SMD = 0.691, 95% CL: 0.149 to 1.233, p = 0.013) while in the finisher period, the effect was weaker (SMD = 0.509, 95% CI: 0.015 to 1.004, p = 0.043). Average daily gain (ADG), feed intake (FI), and feed conversion ratio (FCR) were not affected with FSBM inclusion when compared to control. Subgroup analysis revealed that FI increased in starter period (SMD = 0.582, 95% CI: 0.037 to 1.128, p = 0.036). When considering types of microorganism as moderating variables in the subgroup analysis, we found that Aspergillus oryzae, mixed probiotics+bromelain protease, Bacillus subtilis, and Lactobacillus bacteria significantly increased ADG and FI (p<0.01). Additionally, either Bacillus subtilis+protease or Bacillus subtilis alone decreased FCR (p<0.001). However, meta-regression analysis showed that levels of FSBM inclusion had no effects on final BW (p = 0.502), ADG (p = 0.588), FI (p = 0.861), and FCR (p = 0.462). Conclusion: Substituting SBM in broiler chickens' diet with FSBM improved BW of broiler chickens, especially in the starter period whereas the effects on ADG, FI, and FCR were mostly dependent on microbial strains used for fermentation.

• Journal of Distribution Science
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• v.14 no.2
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• pp.123-133
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• 2016

Purpose - Understanding how service convenience drives shopping performance is imperative for retailers such as department and large discount stores. Retailers have to enhance shopping productivity by reducing the costs of shopping, as convenience triggers customers' perceived shopping value, leading to customer satisfaction, and ultimately patronage behavior. Consumers, generally considering time as a scarce resource, are more sensitive to the time costs of tasks in regard to shopping trip, differently from forming perceptions of convenience in time orientation. Therefore, this study attempts to examine the moderating effects of consumers' time orientation on the relationships among service convenience of retailers and shopping performances such as shopping value and service performances. Research design, data, and methodology - The department and discount store chains were chosen as the point of analysis in this study. Data were collected from a survey of real-life consumers and all respondents were screened to ensure only those who had visited in the department and discount store chains within past six month prior to the day of data collection. Out of 600 self-reported surveys that were distributed, a total of 530 responses were returned and after excluding 20 incomplete responses, the final sample size was 510. The three hypotheses were proposed and tested in this study. The one hypothesis was on the moderating effects of time orientation for the effects of service convenience on shopping value (hedonic and utilitarian shopping value). The other two hypotheses were on the comparisons between high and low time-oriented customers with the effects in shopping value from service performance. Hierarchical moderated regression analysis was used to test the hypotheses. Results - The results suggest that the effect of service convenience on utilitarian shopping value and the positive effect of utilitarian shopping value on customer satisfaction are greater in low time orientation than high time orientation customers. Conversely, when customers are highly oriented toward time, the effects of hedonic shopping value on customer satisfaction and revisit intention are greater than for customers who are lowly oriented toward time. Conclusions - This study has two-fold significance. First, this study contributes to the consumer behavior and services marketing literature by incorporating customers' time orientation into the service convenience-shopping performance. Although the effect of service convenience on shopping performance might differ from customers' perceptions concerning shopping, there has been little investigation or comparison between customers' perception on time. This study is a first attempt to consider how the effects of service convenience on shopping value and service performance vary with differing levels of customers' time orientation. This study advances prior studies by showing that the service convenience-shopping value and service convenience-service performance relationships vary across different combinations of the customer's time orientation. The findings of this study suggest that the retailers need to enhance the experiential aspects of the stores for their high time-oriented customers. Conversely, for the low time-oriented customers, the retailers should boost the visual distinctiveness and ease of store navigation.